Director of Customer & Content Marketing | Top 100 CMA | Love to Learn, Live to Connect | Endlessly Reading

Hey there, friend! Thanks for taking the time to read my bio.

I'm a WYSIWYG type person: What you see is what you get. I'm not one way at work and another outside of it. You're getting 100% the authentic me here, rest assured. 

I'm motivated by helping and teaching people. A huge "powerup" in my career has been focusing intently on voice of the customer, community and connection, and cross-functional collaboration. I also love to #MakeWorkFun << can this be a thing?

On LinkedIn, I post about customer education, customer marketing, and content marketing.

Outside of work, I serve at a small Christian college as a mentor, health coach, faculty, and director of work-based learning. I love to read, hike, run, volunteer, garden, and spend time with friends. I'm also a budding herbalist! 

My core values: Community, Service, Learning, Generosity 

Predictive Index Profile: Maverick

StrengthsFinders: Connectedness, Developer, Responsibility, Positivity, Communication

Meyers-Briggs: ESFJ

One of my favorite ways to learn is right here on LinkedIn. Looking to level up in L&D? Here are some people to follow 👇 

Dr Philippa Hardman
Lavinia Mehedințu
Ross Stevenson
Anamaria Dorgo
Melissa Kruminas
Eugenia Dabu
Julie Dirksen
Patti Shank, PhD
Sarah Cannistra
JD Dillon
Lori Niles-Hofmann
Laura Overton
Ashley & Hannah at MAAS Marketing 🍍
Hadiya Nuriddin, MA, MEd

Who would you add to the list?

#LearningAndDevelopment

Shannon Howard

Talks about #customermarketing and #customereducation

Sr. Director of Customer & Content Marketing | 3x Top 100 CMA | Curator & Connector

Customer marketing often gets relegated to advocacy only. But true customer marketing is about helping your customers succeed, building trust through consistency, and creating strong relationships that naturally result in advocacy. 

Anna Furmanov and I talk about this on the Building with Buyers podcast 🎧 https://lnkd.in/eK8GBhYN

CMA folks - how do you define customer marketing? How have you helped others (even your CMO!) see the value of customer marketing? Curious to get your takes!

If we're treating education like a product, we should market it like a product, too.

Thanks, Echtus, for the opportunity to share how we can market and promote education programs to drive adoption and success!

We’re continuing our CEx (Customer Education Exchange) series with a new blog from Shannon Howard, a seasoned leader who blends customer marketing, content strategy, and education into one powerful lens.

Shannon’s piece explores a challenge many teams face: strong programs with weak adoption. Her approach flips the script by treating education like a true product launch with positioning, messaging, go-to-market planning, and ongoing promotion built in from the start. The result? Programs that don’t just exist in your catalog but earn attention, drive engagement, and deliver meaningful impact.

If you’re looking for a clearer, more intentional way to roll out education in 2026, this is a must-read. Dive into Shannon’s framework here: https://lnkd.in/ewYSXWxv

#CustomerEducation #EducationStrategy #LearningDesign #CExSeries #ThoughtLeadership

What should we be preparing for in 2026? 

Had a chance to connect with John Leh, Angela Masella, and Rob G. about this panel yesterday, and it is going to be such a great conversation! Each of these folks brings significant experience and perspective to the industry.

Not at all surprisingly, we'll talk about how AI is transforming L&D—from content creation to learner experience to administration to assessing skill development at scale. But we'll also have a hot lil debate on skills-based training. 🔥 

Save your seat (or register to get the recording!) here 👉 https://lnkd.in/ejBnpmeK

❓ How do I push back on leadership requests?

This was a Q&A box question from last week's CloudShare webinar.

Here are a few ideas:

1️⃣ Have a plan.

Do you have a documented and communicated plan? If not, it will be really hard to push back, because what are you focused on instead?

And you know there are resources for this:
Webinar with Dave Derington on creating your CE strategy: https://lnkd.in/eKQ2qJ9e

Template for documenting your strategy & plan: https://lnkd.in/evrUmv9V

2️⃣ Make it real.

I don't know what it is about B2B that we forget we are all humans. Help your leaders see through the human lens.

So if they're saying, "We need to do all on-demand training, no VILT," and you don't agree with that, here's what I'd ask: "Can you share with me one of your most memorable learning experiences? What did you love about it?" They're probably going to reference some kind of face-to-face learning and their favorite part was the human interaction. 

Well, if that's the case, why would we settle for less for our learners? 🤔 

3️⃣ Learn to communicate with executives.

This is an art, and like learning any new language, it comes with practice. 

Here's a great blog (with resources, yay!) with suggestions: https://lnkd.in/eRhAaA4Q

I know y'all have thoughts here. Share 'em in the comments!

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